Bleriot Monoplane on Filey Beach.

On Saturday, 20th August 1910 the pilot of this aircraft had made several short flights along the beach at Filey when the aircraft crashed into the sands damaging a wing and the propeller. The pilot was pinned under the engine for a time but was rescued unhurt.

Pilot - Mr John William House, of Bradford.


The Filey at beach.


Messer Albert and son John House owned a Bleriot aircraft which they initially flew from their home area of Bradford. John House had crashed the aircraft at Bradford weeks earlier to this incident at Filey. They then repaired the aircraft and took it aircraft to Filey to attempt to win a prize offered for someone flying the two mile stretch of Filey beach to be awarded only to a person who had not previously won such a competition. After suffering a number of mishaps at Filey in the summer of 1910 the Northern Aero Synicate company they ran went into liquidation. John House is then believed to have joined up with Mr Blackburn in buying a cottage on the cliff tops and assisting him at Filey with his flying activities.

The incident Mr John House sustained while flying at Apperley Bridge occured on 22nd July 1910, after making three short flights in his Bleriot, Mr House crashed the aircraft though he escaped injury. The engine of the Bleriot began to mis-fire and the aircraft lost height, it then struck a stone wall, damaging a wing and the propeller. A photograph of the damaged aircraft exists and this incident will be covered in its own webpage in due course.

John House and his father Albert had formed Northern Aero Synicate at Apperley Bridge in 1909, John had built his own glider in 1905, his father owned the first motor car in Bradford. They flew from Rawden Meadow at Apperley Bridge.